[HPforGrownups] HP goes PC?

[Samaporn Teeravechyan]

No: HPFGUIDX 16785

At 07:08 PM 4/13/01 -0000, you wrote:

>However, I have to say that I personally prefer the elves' attachment 
>to humans to be natural rather than cultural. (Please note that I've 
>used the word 'preference' - there isn't canonical proof that it is 
>so, and JKR may develop the elf issue in either direction). 

>I've said it before that I think that it also makes the moral issues 
>more interesting, because it's not a situation we humans, in the real 
>world, have ever had to deal with. For instance, *is* it fair to 
>treat an elf as an equal? It would be preposterous to even ask 
>this question here, in the real world. In HP, the question is 
>valid and much more intriguing and challenging if house elves have an 
>innate tendency to serve humans. 

I can see how that would be an intriguing question; this moral issue would
take a different slant from what we are used to addressing in the
contemporary world. 
I'm not American and I couldn't care less about PC-ness or unPC-ness, but I
feel very strongly about the idea that any other living creature should be
in a state of natural servitude to humans. A different way of wording it
would be to say that such an arrangement would be absolutely unnatural ...
perhaps if house elves were created by wizards of ages past to serve them,
I could live with the idea.

>Well, in the real world that we live in, 
>ALL differences of class, power, status are the outcome of historical 
>contingencies and cultural rationalizations. In this world I'm as PC 
>as you can find. But, for the sake of variety and pure difference, 
>I'd rather have in a fantasy book humanoid creatures that are truly 
>different from humans; whose difference is innate, not acquired.

The world is already filled innate differences among genders, races, and
species =).

Samaporn


~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
"On ne voit bien qu'avec le coeur. L'essentiel est invisible pour les
yeux." - le renard, "Le Petit Prince"

"Knowing others is wisdom;
 Knowing the self is enlightenment.
 Mastering others requires force;
 Mastering the self needs strength."  - Lao Tzu, "Tao te Ching"